tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post4611290742130102968..comments2020-06-03T14:50:12.458-07:00Comments on - the dance of reason: Poverty or bullets?Sac State Philosophyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17963066908030437925noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post-72576583875881066252017-04-17T14:00:48.237-07:002017-04-17T14:00:48.237-07:00What we should do in practice, given certain moral...What we should do in practice, given certain morally important considerations and arguments, is always challenging when the practice is so far from what we ought to be doing.<br /><br />Both arguments would require some redefinition of ‘economic migrant’ as those who indeed are crossing borders unlawfully for the purposes of seeking prosperity or a better life for their families and not because of any threat against their lives on account of an infringement on their security or subsistence. <br /><br />If we accept these arguments, then some migrants may still be ‘economic migrants,’ as redefined, while others would now qualify as ‘refugees.’ Among those who qualify as refugees, we should not discriminate against any particular individual or group of refugees based on their state of origin or other purely politically-motivated reason. <br /><br />In practice, if we accept only 110,000 refugees, and there were only two groups of refugees, A and B, and B was previously designated as economic migrants, the reclassification would have the effect that you say, we may accept more refugees from group B and fewer refugees from group A. This is, nevertheless, desirable as a matter of fairness.<br /><br />The other upshot of these arguments is that we would reclassify hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people already in the United States who were previously dismissed as economic migrants and even think differently about the many more who entered unlawfully for similar reasons. They may not qualify as a refugee because their lives were not in danger, but, similarly, they came to the US because they did not want their families to go hungry. When we realize how unfair or arbitrary our immigration laws and policies are, we may extend to others more compassion and sympathy. Chong Choe-Smithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05152045055559889660noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post-75284032022956275892017-04-17T11:46:25.566-07:002017-04-17T11:46:25.566-07:00Let&#39;s assume we agree with your post.
Is it...Let&#39;s assume we agree with your post. <br /><br />Is it accurate to think that, in the absence of an increase in the total amount of resources the United States invests in these problems, the practical upshot of accepting your conclusions here is a virtual halving (cutting in one-half) of the number of political refugees we accept? <br /><br />Or, to put the matter even more carefully, that we would reduce the number of political refugees according to whatever percentage of the total amount of people in category X (= political-refugees-plus-economic-migrants) there are seeking entry into the country? <br /><br />So, for example, a halving if the percentage was 50%, a 90% reduction if the percentage was 10%, and so on?<br /><br />I am not sure if this is even a fairly worded question, or whether it obscures too many other important variables. But I am just wondering out loud what the upshots of accepting your conclusions are likely to be here.Russell DiSilvestrohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15518807888567382422noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2492055523235356445.post-16014055629289809542017-04-16T18:18:31.533-07:002017-04-16T18:18:31.533-07:00Thank you for this post, Chong. For now I&#39;ll ...Thank you for this post, Chong. For now I&#39;ll just say that I agree with your considerations, and that I&#39;m glad to read this (I learned two new arguments against what I also consider to be a problematic practice!).sarayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02991536286998326261noreply@blogger.com